The Oklahoma Awakening
July 29th, 2008 at 10:10am Leo Pusateri
‘The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.’
-Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America
The Tenth Amendment, which is supposed to hold weight equal to the First, Second and every other Amendment to the United States Constitution, has in the last 80 years been regarded as “a nice idea” but optional. This has resulted in usurpation of powers from the States in everything from health care to education (and everything in between).
Far from being taken seriously, the Tenth Amendment has become the red-headed stepchild of the Constitution, and has been ignored with impunity by the Federal government.
There is a movement afoot in Oklahoma, however, to rectify the situation:
Oklahomans are trying to recover some of their lost state sovereignty by House Joint Resolution 1089, introduced by State Rep. Charles Key.The resolution’s language, in part, reads: “Whereas, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads as follows: ‘The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.’; and Whereas, the Tenth Amendment defines the total scope of federal power as being that specifically granted by the Constitution of the United States and no more; and whereas, the scope of power defined by the Tenth Amendment means that the federal government was created by the states specifically to be an agent of the states; and Whereas, today, in 2008, the states are demonstrably treated as agents of the federal government. … Now, therefore, be it resolved by the House of Representatives and the Senate of the 2nd session of the 51st Oklahoma Legislature: that the State of Oklahoma hereby claims sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the federal government by the Constitution of the United States. That this serve as Notice and Demand to the federal government, as our agent, to cease and desist, effective immediately, mandates that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated powers.”
The measure passed overwhelmingly in the Oklahoma State House of Representatives, but was hung up in the State Senate (sound familiar?) However, Representative Charles Kay plans to re-introduce the measure when the Oklahoma State House reconvenes next year.
What would upholding the Tenth Amendment entail? Walter E. Williams writes,
Federal usurpation goes beyond anything the Constitution’s framers would have imagined. James Madison, explaining the constitution, in Federalist Paper 45, said, “The powers delegated … to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, [such] as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce. … The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people.” Thomas Jefferson emphasized that the states are not “subordinate” to the national government, but rather the two are “coordinate departments of one simple and integral whole. … The one is the domestic, the other the foreign branch of the same government.”
Of course, the eye of the needle through which the camel squeezed its head was the Fourteenth Amendment, which gave the Federal government the authority to regulate interstate commerce. All well and good; however, meaning of the term “commerce” has been twisted and manipulated to not only cover business transactions between residents of different states, but everything else under the sun:
These scholars interpret interstate commerce to mean “substantial interstate human relations” and find this consistent with the meaning of commerce at the time of the writing of the Constitution. They also argue that this expansive interpretation makes more sense for the foreign and Indian commerce clauses as one would expect Congress to be given authority to regulate non-economic relations with other nations and with Indian tribes.
This ‘liberal translation’ of the term, ‘commerce,’ of course, flies in the face of Jefferson’s writings; which is SOP for liberals, who true to their moniker often take great liberty in using the words of the Constitution as so much silly puddy to bend and shape their meaning to fit their cause d’jour. This led to the creation of FDR’s “New Deal,” which led to the notion that the government pretty much had the right to step in to any situation, for any reason, if there was any indication of interstate commerce whatsoever. While minor shifts toward state’s rights have occurred in between, the Federal Government still maintains overwhelming authority over areas of our lives in which they Constitutionally have no business to regulate.
This could be the start of a groundswell of opportunity to defeat Federal usurpation of power, and to once and for all defeat the federal imposition of liberalism and its even uglier cousin, socialism. I look forward to a Republican legislator from my home state of Minnesota to take up this mantle (I know it won’t be a democrat).
Entry Filed under: Grassroots, Legislation
16 Comments
1. OhioOrrin | July 29th, 2008 at 11:49 am
thx leo 4 reminding B4V folks of a cornerstone of true conservatism as opposed to the current administration & the GOP majority to 06.
Respect States’ rights.
Balance the damn budget.
Secure our borders & ports.
Actually shrink the Fed govt.
Constitutionally impose tariffs (there aint no “free” trade honey).
after the final death blow in November at the Fed, State, & Local levels, we must rebuild an true conservative party & recapture the center to offset expelling the radical right…who aren’t true conservatives either.
2. Brian (Boston) | July 29th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
OhioOrrin, I think everyone wants those objectives, not just conservatives.
3. Aztec | July 29th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
This could be a good thing for Lib’s too. My great state of California would not be prohibited from higher CAFE standards, higher environmental standards etc. Let California continue to lead the nation into the future and Oklahoma regress to the dark ages.
4. Doug | July 29th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
I’m a conservative who doesn’t believe always balancing the budget is a good idea. In fact, I think if we shrunk Federal debt to zero it would be a financial disaster for our country.
Anyhow, I don’t see how Oklahoma’s passing of the resolution does anything at all to affect anything at all. Looks like a bunch of the nonsense resolutions we’ve seen from our state house - you know, the ones where they call for the impeachment of the President, where the legislature doesn’t support the war in Iraq - that kind of stuff. Doesn’t look to be any teeth in it.
Actually, it looks almost like the resolutions put up by the Indian tribes looking for sovereignty.
The issue really isn’t with the interpretation of the commerce clause, it’s with this little beauty in Article I Section 8 giving Congress the power…”to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States;”.
The question is on interpreting what did they mean by providing for the ‘general welfare’. Because if that meant some of the big daddy legislation, the dept. of education, social security, etc. then, of course, the tenth amendment doesn’t apply as the power was already granted.
5. OhioOrrin | July 29th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
Aztec - u better hope the “medival” Oklahomans, & Texans stop the NAFTA Superhighway which, amongst other wrongs, is a massive Federal abuse of eminent domain & an illegal subordination of our Constitution to international trade agreements.
Both sides of the aisle are bought off on this one.
Only Ron Paul & Kucinich addressed this issue.
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=15497
6. Bigfoot | July 29th, 2008 at 1:23 pm
the Fourteenth Amendment, which gave the Federal government the authority to regulate interstate commerce.
The original constitution gave the federal government, specifically Congress, the authority to regulate interstate commerce, as in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3:
(emphasis added)
The 14th Amendment, at least explicitly, does not mention anything about commerce.
Yeah, I’m being nitpicky here, but on the other hand, the main point makes a lot of sense. The term “commerce” has been bastardized. Some have even tried to make violence against women a matter to be covered by the interstate commerce clause. This is not to say that violence against women shouldn’t be treated seriously, but that it’s not a matter of interstate commerce.
7. congressive | July 29th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
Good luck finding any support for Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich here.
Just keep supporting Republicans. They’ve done such a stellar job of dismantling the big bad federal government so far, right?
Right?
8. Leo Pusateri | July 29th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Bigfoot, point taken–thanks for the correction.
Doug, if welfare, social security, medicare and all the other handouts of the 20th century and beyond were part of “promot(ing) the general welfare,” why isn’t it that the founding fathers didn’t immediately establish a Department of Welfare right after writing the Constitution?
9. bongoman | July 29th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
Federal usurpation? Check out the medical marijuana situation in various states for a classic example.
10. Esther Way | July 29th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
I am with you on this. The Federal Government blocked the states from passing legislation that would have prevented the sub-prime mess.
Several years ago, state attorneys general and others involved in consumer protection began to notice a marked increase in a range of predatory lending practices by mortgage lenders. Some were misrepresenting the terms of loans, making loans without regard to consumers’ ability to repay, making loans with deceptive “teaser” rates that later ballooned astronomically, packing loans with undisclosed charges and fees, or even paying illegal kickbacks. These and other practices, we noticed, were having a devastating effect on home buyers. In addition, the widespread nature of these practices, if left unchecked, threatened our financial markets.
Not only did the Bush administration do nothing to protect consumers, it embarked on an aggressive and unprecedented campaign to prevent states from protecting their residents from the very problems to which the federal government was turning a blind eye.
Let me explain: The administration accomplished this feat through an obscure federal agency called the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). The OCC has been in existence since the Civil War. Its mission is to ensure the fiscal soundness of national banks. For 140 years, the OCC examined the books of national banks to make sure they were balanced, an important but uncontroversial function. But a few years ago, for the first time in its history, the OCC was used as a tool against consumers.
In 2003, during the height of the predatory lending crisis, the OCC invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act to issue formal opinions preempting all state predatory lending laws, thereby rendering them inoperative. The OCC also promulgated new rules that prevented states from enforcing any of their own consumer protection laws against national banks.
If the fed honored states right, they never would have done this and the sub prime mess would have been avoided.
11. js | July 29th, 2008 at 11:08 pm
the federal government also over wrote existing state laws restricting usury rates that have existed for hundreds of years by allowing banks with “na” or the term “national” in thier name to charge consumers 35+% on credit cards…plus uncapped fees beyond that…during a time when the government T Bills dinged 1.79%
its supposed to hedge credit card companies against inflation…by robbing americans blind….
12. Nevada Pundit | July 29th, 2008 at 11:52 pm
Esther Way,
I’m not sure if your aware, but at this point in time there are 33 states that have mortgage restrictions greater than that of the federal government. These restrictions range from fee caps, to additional well disclosure, and in the extreme (and in my opinion as a mortgage underwriter) the best case of Illinois which require borrowers to attend a class if they try for any loan other than a conventional fixed loan.
With all that said I do agree with the sentiment of the Oklahoma congress. By leaps and bounds the federal government has stepped on sovereignty of the states. Unfortunately the time for that protest is long gone. Without a combined effort of many states to put pressure on the federal government business will continue as usual, and if that law ever does pass the federal government has more than enough tools at its disposal to put Oklahoma “back in its place”. For better or worse the one and only true power base in this country is in D.C.
It is a shame that such a beautifully thought out constitution is only vaguely the law of the land. A document written in a way that the government stayed out of your life ( you know, gave you freedom ) and stayed focused on what it was supposed to do. Precedent and interpretation have diminished the power of one of the greatest documents ever written.
13. Mark Noonan | July 30th, 2008 at 2:04 am
Nevada,
And, of course, led us to the absurd situation where 90% or so of the land in our great State of Nevada is owned by Uncle Sam…we can’t turn around here in Nevada without checking with the Bureau of Land Management…and they’ve done such a stellar job managing our land for us (Nevada Test Site, nuke run off into Lake Mead…).
I’m all for this and I’m ready for the federal lawsuit - and this, of course, is yet another reason to get enthused about McCain…McCain could very well appoint the Justice who provides the majority to return our government to the people.
14. Rana Quijotesca | July 30th, 2008 at 3:37 am
First of all, I would like to say that the 14th Amendment says nothing about interstate commerce… that’s Article I, buddy…
After thinking about it, most of the infringements upon State’s Rights that have used the Interstate Commerce Clause that I can think of were enacted/supported by conservatives/Republicans. Immediately, I start thinking of the War on Drugs/medical marijuana, the EPA invalidating California’s state CAFE standards, the various stories of predatory lending prohibitions banned by Congress, using Highway funds as leverage to get the states to raise their drinking age, and other situations (usually pertaining to consumer protections).
On the other hand, the 14th Amendment (equal protection under the law) issues that Conservatives tend to think are infringements on states’ rights revolve around things that guarantee rights… The Civil Rights Act, The Voting Rights Act, prohibition of sodomy laws, and environmental protections are among these, and they tend to be liberal issues.
Is there a reason for this pattern? Is it coincidence? Is it just pure politicking?
15. Michael Rowe | July 30th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Nevada:
You wrote: “I’m not sure if your aware, but at this point in time there are 33 states that have mortgage restrictions greater than that of the federal government.”
I think you missed Esther’s point. She wrote: “the OCC invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act to issue formal opinions preempting all state predatory lending laws, thereby rendering them inoperative.”
So those tough lending laws in 33 states were useless and unenforceable.
16. Things I Haven’t Bl&hellip | July 31st, 2008 at 7:43 am
[...] Leo Pusateri writing at Blogs For Victory examines a movement in the state of Oklahoma that thinks the 10th amendment to the U.S. Constitution means what it says. Here is Leo’s set up: The Tenth Amendment, which is supposed to hold weight equal to the First, Second and every other Amendment to the United States Constitution, has in the last 80 years been regarded as “a nice idea” but optional. This has resulted in usurpation of powers from the States in everything from health care to education (and everything in between). [...]